Throughout the history of mail delivery, there has been a gradual evolution whereby the post office encourages mailers to prepare their mail in such a way as to reduce the effort required on the part of the post office for processing such mail. As an inducement to the mailer to prepare the mail in such a way so as to bring about faster mail delivery, the post office offers several levels of postage discount to mailers. The level of discount typically is based on the number of criteria met by the mailer. For example, in order to maximize such postage discounts, the post office requires that high volume mailers presort the mailpieces, apply a Zip+4 bar code to each mailpiece, and package their mail into trays with each tray tagged in accordance with the Domestic Mail Manual.
Previously, large volume mailers have performed the sorting process on conventional off-line sorting equipment, however the traying process is still performed manually. Smaller volume mailers may perform both the sorting and traying processes manually. Clearly such manual traying is not efficient for large volume mailers.
As described in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,429,249 to Belec et al., this drawback was overcome by the direct interface of a multi-bin sorting device with an inserter system. This inserter system performs automated sorting of mailpieces in accordance with predetermined postal discount requirements. Essentially, the system consists of an inserter for assembling the mailpieces and a sorter coupled to the inserter for automatically sorting and traying the mailpieces. The sorter includes a sorter controller and a plurality of on-edge sorting bins. The system also includes means for communicating mailpiece data and configuration data to the sorter controller. The sorter controller controls the sorting of mailpieces received from the inserter into sort groups according to postal discount requirements.
In order to prevent the occasional jamming of mailpieces as they are diverted into designated trays of the sorter device; the inserter system implemented an anti-jamming kicker gate. The kicker gate, when actuated, aligns with the actuated gate of a tray to allow smooth entry of a mailpiece from a transport of the inserter system into a tray of the sorting device. Upon deactuation, the kicker gate returns to its original position thereby "kicking" the tail of the mailpiece inwardly into the tray and away from the entry area of the tray. Such a kicker-gate mechanism is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,718,660 to Daboub. But, even though this kicker gate proved to be reliable it suffered from occasional drawbacks in that the kicking gate occasional damaged a mailpiece through its "kicking" action against a mailpiece. Additional, this anti-jamming mechanism is complex and expensive to implement because it requires an exact timing scheme for actuation of the kicker gate.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a sorting device that can be implemented at the output end on an inserting system having an improved and simplified mechanism for preventing jamming of mailpieces that are conveyed into individual sorting bins of the sorting device.